Sunday, December 16, 2018

My personal finance journey in Canada starting from 2010 (first 24 months)

Dec. 16, 2018

Introduction


It is very tough journey for me to stay in Canada starting from 2010. I did not have a job and I immigrated to Canada without enough working skills and also financial knowledge on April 23, 2010. I like to write down my journey starting from April 23, 2010.

My rich journey


April 23, 2010 


I arrived to Canada, and then I made a transaction almost losing $4,000 dollars based on my real consumption. I purchased Canadian dollars using $17,000 dollars in one transaction, the first day I arrived in Canada. Here is the blog to document my purchase.

Actionable Items:

Learn asking questions. Think about alternatives. Do some research in advance. Do not go for a big purchase any time. I did make mistake on brand new car in 1999 Ford Explorer, 2002 on SONY laptop $1800 us dollars, 2001 Shanghai vacation with my relatives over $6,000 us dollars. I have the issues to handle big projects, I am not a good project manager at all, I could not make a plan and a budget and I was under influence of people.

Anything above $1,000 dollars, there is business opportunities for me to learn save at least 10% cost.

January, 2012 


China vacation over one month. I ended up spending over $5,000 Canadian dollars, more than 50% saving from June 2010 to 2012 January, 18 months full time work.

Here is my cashout in China in one month vacation. I took the cash over $16,000 Chinese yuan. I was an ATM machine; I did not do enough research how to protect myself financially. I chose the wrong time wrong place to take vacation,











Here is the summary of withdraw.



I have to go through the learning process again, how to learn to stay away from impulsive spending, without a budget, and I did not have my own home in the city of Vancouver. My mom had her salary enough for two people expense, her home paid off by me back in 2000. I just spent those cash for a holiday. It was so brutal to learn those financial mistakes I made in January 2019. Personal finance research is a tough business to push through.

Actionable Items:

I also needed to learn how to take vacation. When to take vacation, how long should I take when I have a full time job. I was lucky in 2012 to take one month vacation. The website was not down. A few years later, the website was hacked and I learned that I was luck those years from 2010 to 2014. I should take one week vacation only at most one time, and be a responsible person. If anything happens at work, then I will be back in less than one week. I also need to cut expenses down, say no to a lot of expenses. Specially I should say no to extra spending. I bought over 10 pieces coat prices in 2002 vacation in China alone.

I will write down more challenges I came cross after 2012 January.

I do not take any vacation day in 2010 and 2011. Instead I should take 1 or 2 vacation days to get familiar with small cities near Vancouver, and I should start to learn to invest in real estate. At least I should spend time to study videos on youtube.com.

Big waste


I took FAU graduate study on research from 2010 June to 2011 August, I did  not have income from United States. Instead I paid over $2,000 US dollars to pay 2010 Fall term, 2011 spring and fall term out-of-state tuition. I learned that I cannot make it work for a late project.

$2,000 dollars is over 400 hours work as a minimum wage worker. If my research has value, then some one will pay for me to do the work. I was so scared to stop the program when I signed to quit the program, relinquish my F1-status in 2011.

Summary 


It was very tough first two years in my life in Canada in terms of my personal finance and I did not learn the value of dollars, my vacation of China $5,000 dollars, which can be 30% of 1500 square condo in the city of Yichun, Jiangxi province. I did not learn how much power I can use those money on investment instead of on food, travel, sightseeing, and those cash gift. I like so many expensive things, road trip, winter coats, and gourmet food.

Statistics 


It is easy to come out the loss of all the cash in the following:

$4000 one transaction loss, $17000 US dollar to purchase Canadian dollars
$2000 US dollars tuition
$5000 Canadian dollar one vacation to china

In total, over 10,000 dollar loss.

Opportunity cost - I should invest a condo in Chilliwack with price around $50,000 Canadian dollars in 2011, so I sell it with triple price in 2018.

I no longer can purchase a condo in China since I am in Canadian citizen. But I got Canadian citizen in 2014. I should consider to purchase a home in 2001 in my home town.


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